Management of annotated location aware assets

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9631934-B2
Application number	US-201213731309-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 31, 2012
Priority date	Oct 23, 2012
Publication date	Apr 25, 2017
Grant date	Apr 25, 2017

Abstract

According to one general aspect, a method may include storing, in a memory device, a plurality of floor maps, each floor map indicating the structural layout of a respective predefined physical location. The method may include storing, in a memory device, a plurality of point-of-interest (POI) data structures. Each POI data structure may include a physical location of an associated POI. The method may include receiving a floor map request from a client computing device, wherein the floor map request includes a requested location. The method may include based upon the location included by the floor map request, selecting a selected floor map and a selected subset of the plurality of POI data structures. The method may include transmitting, to the client computing device, a response to the floor map request based upon the selected floor map and the selected POI data structures.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
storing, in a memory device, a plurality of floor maps, each floor map indicating a layout of a physical location;
storing, in a memory device, a plurality of point-of-interest (POI) data structures, wherein
each POI data structure includes an element indicating a physical location of a POI,
each POI data structure includes POI metadata indicating a status of the POI, and
each POI data structure includes at least one action that can be performed on the POI, the at least one action being based on at least one of a role of a user of the POI or a role of a user of a device in communication with the POI, the at least one action including an indication as to whether or not the action is to be performed periodically;

receiving a floor map request from a client computing device, wherein the floor map request includes a requested location;
based upon the location included by the floor map request, selecting a floor map and a subset of the POI data structures; and
transmitting, to the client computing device, in response to the floor map request, the selected floor map and the selected POI data structures.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein transmitting includes:
generating an annotated floor map, based upon the selected floor map and including, for each selected POI data structure, a POI indicator, wherein the POI indicator is placed on the floor map at a location representing the physical location of the POI and indicates both the type of the POI and a status of the POI; and
transmitting, the annotated floor map to the client computing device.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein transmitting the response to the floor map request includes:
dividing the annotated floor map into a plurality of tiles,
receiving a request to view a portion of the annotated floor map that includes the transmitted tiles, and
transmitting, to the computing device, one or more of the tiles based on the portion of the annotated floor map.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein selecting the subset of POI data structures includes:
determining a subset of the POI data structures based upon a distance between the requested location and the physical location of a POI that is associated with the selected POI data structure.

5. The method of claim 1 ,
wherein the POI metadata includes a type of the POI, and the status of the POI.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving a request from the computing device to perform the action on one or more of the POIs.

7. The method of claim 6 , further comprising:
determining if the action may be performed remotely, and
if the performance of the action requires assistance of the remote computing device, transmitting, via a network interface, an action request message, to the remote computing device, that includes a request to perform at least a portion of the action.

8. The method of claim 1 ,
further comprising:
detecting a change in the POI metadata; and
transmitting, to the client computing device, an update message that includes the change to the POI metadata.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the floor map request includes a filtering criteria; and
wherein selecting a subset of the plurality of POI data structures includes selecting a POI data structure only if the POI data structure passes the filtering criteria.

10. An apparatus comprising:
a storage medium configured to:
store a plurality of floor maps, each floor map indicating a layout of a physical location, and
store a plurality of point-of-interest (POI) data structures, wherein
each POI data structure includes an element indicating a physical location of a POI,
each POI data structure includes POI metadata indicating a status of the POI, and
each POI data structure includes at least one action that can be performed on the POI, the at least one action being based on at least one of a role of a user of the apparatus or a role of a user of a device in communication with the apparatus, the at least one action including an indication as to whether or not the action is to be performed periodically;

a network interface configured to receive a floor map request from a client computing device, wherein the floor map request includes a requested location; and

a processor configured to:
based upon the location included by the floor map request, selecting a floor map and a subset of the POI data structures; and
transmitting, to the client computing device, in response to the floor map request the selected floor map and the selected POI data structures.

11. The apparatus of claim 10 ,
wherein the processor is configured to generate an annotated floor map, based upon the selected floor map and including, for each selected POI data structure, a POI indicator,
wherein the POI indicator is placed on the floor map at a location representing the physical location of the POI and indicates both the type of the POI and a status of the POI; and
wherein the network interface is configured to transmit, the annotated floor map to the client computing device.

12. The apparatus of claim 11 ,
wherein the processor is configured to divide the annotated floor map into a plurality of tiles, and;
receive a request to view a portion of the annotated floor map that includes the transmitted tiles; and
wherein the network interface is configured to transmit, to the computing device, one or more of the tiles based on the portion of the annotated floor map.

13. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the processor is configured to:
determine a subset of the plurality of POI data structures based upon a distance between the requested location and the physical location of a POI that is associated with the selected POI data structure.

14. The apparatus of claim 10 ,
wherein the POI metadata includes type of the POI, and the status of the POI.

15. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the network interface is configured to receive a request from the computing device to perform the action on one or more of the POIs.

16. The apparatus of claim 15 , wherein the processor is configured to:
determine if the action may be performed remotely; and
the network interface is configured to, if the performance of the action requires assistance of the remote computing device, transmit an action request message, to the remote computing device, that includes a request to perform at least a portion of the action.

17. The apparatus of claim 10 ,
wherein the processor is configured to detect a change in the POI metadata; and
wherein the network interface is configured to transmit, to the client computing device, an update message that includes the change to the POI metadata.

18. The apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the floor map request includes a filtering criteria; and
wherein the processor is configured to select a POI data structure only if the POI data structure passes the filtering criteria.

19. A computer program product for asset management, the computer program product being tangibly and non-transitorily embodied on a computer-readable medium and including executable code that, when executed, is configured to cause an apparatus to:
store, in a memory device, a plurality of floor maps, each floor map indicating a layout of a physical location;
store, in a memory device, a plurality of point-of-interest (POI) data structures, wherein
each POI data structure includes an element indicating a physical location of a POI,
each POI data structure includes POI metadata indicating a status of the POI, and

Assignees

• Bmc Software Inc

Inventors

• Cline Troy
• He Ting
• Gere Wesley
• Graham Jason L
• Behnia Kia

Classifications

• G06T11/26

  Drawing of charts or graphs · CPC title

• H04W4/023

  using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds · CPC title

• G01C21/206 Primary

  specially adapted for indoor navigation · CPC title

• G06F16/245

  Query processing · CPC title

• H04W4/70

  Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC] · CPC title